Oil-stove



2 Sheets8heet 1.

(NoModeL) i J, D. GALLAGHER & D. L. ADLER.

OIL STOVE. Y

I Patented Dec. 17, 1895.

WITNESSES: INVENTORY) (No Model.) 2 Sheets-Sheet 2 J. 'D. GALLAGHER 8vD. L. ADLER.

OIL STOVE. No. 551,466.

Patented. Dec. 17 1895.

FICLG (BREW aaunm. PhUrCHlYnuWAsl-HN 510N176 UNITED STATES PATENTOFFicE.

JOSEPH D. GALLAGHER, OF BLOOMFIELD, AND DAVID L. ADLER, OF NElVARK, NEWJERSEY.

OIL-STOVE.

SPECIFICATION forming part of Letters Patent No. 551 ,466, datedDecember 1'7, 1895.

Application filed November 13, 1894. Serial No. 528,631. (No model.)

To all whom it may concern.-

Be it known that we, JOSEPH I). GALLA- GHER, residing at Bloomfield, andDAVID L. ADLER, residing at Newark, in the county of Essex and State ofNew Jersey, citizens of the United States, have invented certain new anduseful Improvements in Oil-Stoves; and we do hereby declare thefollowing to be a full, clear, and exact description of the invention,such as will enable others skilled in the art to which it appertains tomake and use the same,

Figure 1 of the drawings is a front eleva' tion of the oil-stove with apart of the side of the burner-pan broken away to show the incombustibleporous material I) within it.

Fig. 2 is a vertical section of the burner-pan C and the oil-reservoirB, showing the bur her-pan filled with the incombustible porousmaterial'h and showing the well 0. Fig. 3 is a perspective view of theburner-pan 0, showing the surface of the incombustible porous materialZ2 and the well c. Fig. 4: is a vertical section of the base of thestove containing the oil-reservoir and of the burner-pan above, showingthe incombustible porous matcrial only partly filling the burner-pan O.

This invention relates to certain improvements in oil-stoves andparticularly to the means employed to prevent the heating of the oilcontained in the oil-reservoir and the generation of gases when thestove is in use.

In the use of oil-stoves there is always more or less danger ofexplosion. This is due to the heating of the oil in the oil-reservoir bythe flames of t-he'wicks and the consequent generation of gases whichcommunicate with the flames of the wicks. It is also sometimes due tothe overturning of the stove and the escape of the oil in a heatedcondition and its ignition from the flames of the wicks.

It is well known that the better grades of burning-oil will not ignitewhen brought into contact with flames unless the oil first be heatedconsiderably. This heating of the oil is due among other things to thefact that the wick-tubes which communicate with the oilreservoir becomevery much heated by the flames of the wicks and being usually of metaland continuous transmit the heat to the oil-reservoir. Various deviceshave been recommended and, used to prevent this overheating of the oilin the oil-reservoir. Among these devices are the separation of theburner-pan from the oil-reservoir, leavingalayer of air interposedbetween the flames and the oil-reservoir, the interposition of a layerof some non-conducting material, such as asbestos or cement, and thefilling of the burnerpan with water. All these devices have proceededupon the principle of interposing some non-conducting material betweenthe flames and the oil-reservoir so that the heat generated by theflames would be retarded in reaching the oil-reservoir. None of themhave done away with the heating of the wick-tubes and the transmissionof the heat along those tubes to the oil-reservoir, and none of themhave operated upon the principle of actually consuming the heat and sopreventing its transmission to the oil. lVhen any of these old deviceshave been used the wick-tubes have still been heated and the verynon-conn1unicated to the wick-tubes by the flames has been transmitteddirectly and in a practically undiminished degree to the oil in theoil-reservoir, and this must necessarily happen no matter what fillingor layer is interposed between the wick-tubes and the oilreservoirunless some means be devised "to use or consume the heat generated bythe flames in some work other than that of heating the oil in theoil-reservoir. It has therefore been the principal object of ourinvention to devise some method of consumingthe heat before it reachesthe oil-reservoir by prcviding other work for it to do.

It is a perfectly well-known physical fact that in the evaporation ofwater heat is consumed, and therefore if we could devise any method bywhich considerable quantities of water could be evaporated by the heatgenerated by the flames of the wicks it was manifest that the heatgenerated by the flames would be exhausted or consumed by doing the workof evaporating the water and would not be transmitted to theoil-reservoir. Also it was manifest that even if the upper part of thewick-tube became heated there was no necessity that this heat should betransmitted to the oil-reservoir if at some point along the wick-tubesthe heat could be utilized for the purpose of evaporating water. It waslikewise manifest upon the most casual inspection that placing a solidor continuous body of waterbetween the flames and the oil-reservoir waspractically useless, as such a body of water did not present enoughsurfaces to the heat and the atmosphere to be quickly evaporated, andinstead of the heat being entirely consumed in turning that body ofwater into vapor a large portion was used in heating the entire body ofwater, which also heated the oil-reservoir, and another portiontransmitted along the wickrtubes directly to the oil-reservoir.

Wediscovered that by meansof certain mechanical arrangements hereinafterspecified it was possible to divide the water which we desired tointerpose between the flames and the oil-reservoir into innumerablesmall particles or bodies, each of which would present all its surfacesto the heat and atmosphere and would thus be much more readily turnedinto vapor than a large and compact body of water would be,.and wediscovered that when such a finely-divided body of water was interposedbetween the flames and the oil-reservoir the heat generated by theflames was expended in evaporating this water.

The mechanical arrangement to which we have referred consists of theinterposition between the flames of the wicks and the oilreservoir ofsome body so constructed as to contain within its mass a large number ofvery small chambers, spaces, or cells having comparatively freecommunication one with the other throughout the mass. This structureenables the filling of the chambers or cells of such interposed bodywith water which will pass from one part to the other of the interposedbody almost as freely as if not separated into divisions, and yet willbe divided into innumerable small particles or bodies presenting manyexposed surfaces to the heat and atmosphere. The heat from the flamesbeing then communicated to the substance of this interposed body and tothe wick-tubes passing through the same is expended or consumed in thework of evaporating the water contained in each of these small spaces,chambers, or cells. At the same time if by reason of unequaldistribution of the heat, as will happen, the water from a certainportion of this interposed body is more quickly evaporated than that inother portions, by reason of the free intercommunication between thedifferent chambers or cells, the water will flow from other parts tothat part which has been exhausted and thus the heat at the hottestportion will be continuallyemployed or expended in turning these freshsupplies of Water into vapor. The advantages of this method the samecondition of aifairs exists.

and structure over the former methods and structures are manifest.

hen a body of dead air is relied upon to form the non-conducting orprotective body interposed between the flames and the oilreservoir,while it doubtless prevents in some degree the direct communication byradiation of the heat from the flames to the oil, it in no wise preventsthe transmission of the heat from the flames along the wick-tubes, butrat-her aids in such transmission, as the dead air, being a badconductor of heat, prevents the lateral radiation of the heat from thewicktubes and the whole heat imparted to the wicl; tubes by the flamesin practically-undiminished degree is transmitted to the oil in theoilreservoir. Then a filling or stratum of some solid non-conductingmaterial is interposed between the flames and the oil-reservoir aboutThe non conducting layer or stratum to a certain degree prevents thetransmission of heat by radiation from the flames to the oil-reservoirand thus protects the oil from the heat; but on the other hand it acts,as does the dead air, as a non-conductor and so prevents the heattransmitted through the wick-tubes from being radiated laterally throughthe non-conducting layer and compels its transmission inpractically-undiminished degree to the oilreservoir. When a continuousand compact body of water is interposed between the flames and theoil-reservoir, as is very common in oilstoves, the same difficulty isagain met with only to not so large a degree. Some portion of the heatis doubtless expended or consumed in evaporating this body of water atthe surface and to this extent is prevented from being transmitted tothe oil; but on the other hand the heat communicated to the wick-tubesis not readily transmitted laterally through the water and isconsequently carried in practically undiminished degree along thewick-tubes to the oil. Again the water is heated throughout its wholebody and that heat again is transmitted to the oil-reservoir. Again thewater is liable to spill out when the stove is moved, and in no sense issuch a body of water the equivalent of our invention.

Our invention does not consist in the interposition of a porous layerbetween the flames and the oil-reservoir, but in the interposition ofabody of water between the flames and the oil, divided into innumerablesmall particles or bodies each presenting its surface to the heat andatmosphere, so that such water will be readily evaporated and the heatfrom the Wicks will be consumed in that work and prevented from reachingthe oil-reservoir. A

part of this invention is also the mechanical means used to keep thewater in such finelydivided condition.

Referring to the accompanying drawings, the letter A designates the baseof the oilstove, having therein the oil-reservoir B.

The letter O designates the burner-pan which rests upon said base A andcontains the wick-tubes a a and the incombustible porous layer orfilling Z). The letter c designates the water reservoir below the porousfilling which we employ in one of our described constructions, and theletter 0 designates the well int-o which the water is poured and whichserves to indicate the amount of water in the filling.

The base A is constructed in any of the ways in which the bases foroil-stoves are usually constructed, our invention not requiring anyparticular construction of the base, except that it shall be soconstructed that the burner-pan C if made a separate part shall fitaccurately on the base and be held there in any of the ordinary ways.

The burner-pan C in our invention may either be integral with the base Acontaining the oil-reservoir 15 or it may be separate from it, thesecond form being shown in the drawings, it being only essential thatthe burnerpan shall be absolutely water-tight and that the flange orside 6 of the burner-pan shall be of sufficient height to contain asufficiently thick layer of incombustible porous material. We have foundthat from one inch to one and a half inches is a sufficient height forsuch flange e in the smaller sizes of stoves, but the height will ofcourse vary with the size of the stove.

In the burner-pan 0, around the wick-tubes a a, we then place apermanent and substantial layer or filling of some exceedingly porous orcellular substance, preferably filling the whole of the burner-pan,though we may only partly fill the same, leaving below the filling fromone-quarter to one-half an inch of unfilled space to form awater-reservoir c, as is shown in Fig. l. This porous material may becomposed of any porous substance which is incombustible and rigid orhard. It must, however, be of suflicient porosity to absorbaconsiderable quantity of water and its porosity should be such as toprovide free comm unica- CAI tion between its cells. lVe prefer to usefor this layer an exceedingly porous and cellular unglazed earthenwarewhich is made in a form to fit the burner-pan and is then fastened intoplace by cement or plaster in the usual way. When this porous orcellular filling is so constructed as to only partly fill the burnerpan,leaving a water-reservoir below, it must be provided with a series ofclosely-contiguous points extending from its bottom to the bottom of thewater-reservoirbelow. hen this layer of porous or cellular material hasbeen placed in the burner-pan and firmly fastened into place, we pourinto it through the well a as much water as the porous or cellularfilling' will take up. If sufficiently porous and cellular it shouldtake up not less than onehalf of its own volume of water, and when theform is used in which the water-reservoir c is contained it will take upeven more, and we continue to pour in water until the water rises tothesurface of the porous filling,which will be indicated by the permanentlevel of the water in the well 0. When this is done the stove iscomplete and ready for use.

lVe claim 1. In an oil stove, apernianentsubstantial layer ofincombustible porous or cellular material of the kind described filledor combined with water and interposed between the top of the wick tubesand the oil reservoir, substantially as described.

2. In an oil stove, the combination of the burner pan 0 with a permanentand substantial layer of incombustible porous or cellular material ofthe kind described filled or co1nbined with water, and having the wella", sub stantially as described.

In testimony whereof we aifix our signatures in presence of twowitnesses.

JOSEPH D. GALLAGHER. DAVID L. ADLER. \Vitnesses:

A. B. V AN LIEw, A. E. BENNETT.

